inspirations & ideas from the west coast

Raspberry Blueberry Jam

Last month I was able to get my hands on some nice raspberries and made two batches of jam: a batch of raspberry and a batch of raspberry blueberry. I haven’t made raspberry jam for ages and since we’re still trying to use up the strawberry jam from last year, I knew it was time to do something different.

This was my second time using a different kind of pectin than the standard Certo that I grew up with and have used for eons. I had seen Pomona’s Pectin in the stores but until this year I never knew what it really was or why a person would use it. Now I’m hooked and will try not to go back to Certo again unless necessary. Pomona’s is the pectin you want if you’re trying to make as natural a jam as possible.

With Pomona’s you use a lot less sugar than you would use with Certo so it’s great for making low sugar jams. It’s a little different because it has two parts: the crystals and something called calcium water. You have to make up the calcium water from a powder that you get in the Pomona’s packet but once you make it up it can last in your fridge for quite some time. It’s not hard to use Pomona’s, it just takes a couple of extra steps.

This is a shot of the raspberry blueberry jam boiling up in my stockpot. (I hate getting hot jam splashed on me so try to use a tall-sided pot when I think that might happen!)

And these are jars of the two different kinds of jam waiting to be taken down to my canning rack in the basement.

This was also my first time making the raspberry blueberry combination and I’m excited to see how it turns out. I think it might be a great and flavourful jam for making jam bars at some point but I have some of last year’s jam stores to use up in that way first. I certainly don’t eat a ton of jam but since we still have a small person in the house, homemade jam is still a “must do” on my summer canning list.